- Haris Tabakovic leads Hertha to victory over Bundesliga side Mainz 05 in the DFB Cup.
- Borussia Dortmund are also in the round of 16 thanks to a 1-0 home win against Hoffenheim.
- Bayer Leverkusen struggled to an ultimately clear 5-2 away win against third division side Sandhausen.
Hertha knocked Bundesliga side Mainz 05 (up to 70th with Edimilson Fernandes/without Silvan Widmer) out of the DFB Cup 3-0 at home. Great thanks once again go to striker Haris Tabakovic. The 29-year-old scored the goals to make it 2-0 (50th/penalty) and the decisive 3-0 (61st/header). In doing so, he increased his goal account for the Berliners to 12 in 12 games. The Mainz team, winless at the bottom of the Bundesliga table, didn’t come up with enough against a dominant Hertha over the entire season.
Dortmund has maintained its good form in the cup. In the home game against Hoffenheim, a goal from crowd favorite Marco Reus shortly before half-time was enough to secure a more than deserved victory. The 34-year-old converted a cross from Jamie Bynoe-Gittens, although he did not hit the ball as intended. Goalie Gregor Kobel remained clean for the third time in the last four games.
Leverkusen with more effort than expected
Surprisingly, everything in the Hardtwaldstadion in Sandhausen was open until shortly before the end. Leverkusen, leaders of the Bundesliga, had much more trouble than expected against their opponents from the 3rd division. Bayer, who only played with Granit Xhaka from the 64th minute onwards, took the lead twice and the blatant outsider was able to react twice. But the home team had no answer to Adam Hlozek’s 3-2 lead (85′). On the contrary: Amine Adli scored a brace within 4 minutes to make the final score 5-2.
Paderborn celebrated a big victory away in Freiburg. The 12th place in the 2nd Bundesliga won 3-1 against the first division team from Breisgau. Paderborn had already taken the favorites by surprise in the first half. Filip Bilbija scored in the 4th minute and half an hour later Florent Muslija added one more with a beautiful free kick goal. Freiburg only managed a consolation goal from Maximilian Eggestein (70th) in the second half to make it 1:3.
Magdeburg: 5 goals scored, victory after penalty shootout
In the duel between Holstein Kiel and Magdeburg, both from the 2nd Bundesliga, something strange happened: the guests scored a whopping 5 goals, but the score was still 3-3 after extra time. After a 2-0 half-time lead, Magdeburg involuntarily got themselves into trouble with two own goals within 7 minutes. They took the lead again in extra time, but Kiel managed to equalize in the 120th + 2 minute. But there was still a happy ending: Magdeburg held on better nerve in the penalty shootout.
Eintracht Frankfurt won a lackluster 2-0 win away to third division side Viktoria Köln. The “Eagles” took the lead after a quarter of an hour through Ellyes Shkiri, and Ansgar Knauff put the lid on it in the 90th minute.